Welcome to Hyperion Records, an independent British classical label devoted to presenting high-quality recordings of music of all styles and from all periods from the twelfth century to the twenty-first.

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'This would have been a massive project for even the biggest international label, but from a small independent … it is a miracle. An ideal Christ ...'Please give me the complete Hyperion Schubert songs set – all 40 discs –and, in the next life, I promise I'll "re-gift" it to Schubert himself … ...» More

Enough of ditties!
But kisses! kisses!
And heart against heart,
and swooning glances
filled with tears,
blissful tears,
and sighs,
sighs so sweet!

And he who seeks those ditties
(and can hold his tongue)
by the alder brook
where the flowers grow,
the little blue flowers,
beneath the linden tree
in the miller’s garden –
he will find them
wafting
to and fro
in the evening breeze,
under the shimmering stars.

Ah, who might hear them,
and understand them?
Who might sing them again
in rhyming verse,
those songs?

Fair ladies, wise gentlemen,
and all who enjoy a good spectacle,
I invite you to a brand-new entertainment
in an absolutely brand-new style.
Simply fashioned, artlessly arranged,
adorned with noble German simplicity,
as jaunty as a lad in a town soldier’s uniform;
and there’s also a little pious humility for the audience.
For me that’s enough of a recommendation;
if you too like the sound of it, then come in.

As it’s wintertime I expect you
won’t regret a brief hour here in the countryside;
for just let me say that in my song today
spring blooms with all its flowers.
The impromptu action takes place outside,
in the fresh air, far from city gates, through
the woods and fields, in the hills and valleys.
And whatever can only happen between four walls
you’ll half see through the open window;
thus Art is satisfied, and you too.

Yet if you ask about the characters in the play
I must lament to the Muses: I can
really and truly present to you but one,
a young, blond miller’s lad.
For, though the brook also speaks at the end,
this doesn’t make a brook into a character.
So today you must make do with a one-man drama.
He who gives more than he has is a thief.

The set, too, is richly decorated,
carpeted with green velvet,
colourfully embroidered with a thousand flowers,
with road and path marked out over them.
The sun shines down brightly
and refracts its light in dew and in tears;
and the moon, too, looks out from the veil of cloud,
melancholy, as fashion demands.

The background is wreathed in tall woods;
a dog barks, a hunting-horn rings outcheerfully;
here the infant spring gushes from the steep rock
and, now a silvery brook, flows in the valley.
The mill-wheel roars, the machinery rattles, and
you can hardly hear the birds in the nearby grove.
So if you find many of these ditties too rough-and-ready,
bear in mind that this goes with the setting.
But the fairest thing about these wheels
my solo actor will reveal.
If I were to give it away, it would spoil his play.
Farewell, and enjoy yourselves!

Since we like to end with a round number
I again enter this full room
as the twenty-fifth, and final, poem,
as the epilogue, which likes to utter the finest words.
But the brook has already queered my pitch
with the sodden tones of its funeral oration.
From the hollow sounds of this watery organ
everyone is better able to draw the moral for himself;
I give in, and bury the hatchet,
for conflict is not my province.

So all that remains for me to do
is to end by wishing you good night.
We blow out our sun and stars.
Find your way home safely in the dark;
and if you wish to dream a light dream
when you shut your eyes for a long night’s sleep,
think of the mill-wheel and the foaming water
until your head whirls;
and if you lead a maiden by the hand,
ask for a pledge of love in parting, and if today
she gives you what she has often denied,
think faithfully of the faithful miller.
At every squeeze of the hand, at every kiss,
at every passionate surge of the heart,
grant him love for his brief sorrow;
grant him lasting bliss in your hearts.